Ajay Devgan's serious business

Komal Nahta

Ajay Devgan has already spent a fortune shooting his dream project, Raju Chacha. And now, we hear, he is spending heavily on the special effects for the film, which stars Ajay, his wife Kajol and Rishi Kapoor.

Three Bombay-based studios (CMM, Crest and Western Outdoor) and the top three Madras studios (Pentafour, Prime Focus and Total Infotech) have pooled their resources to create the computer-enhanced special effects for the film.

Pentafour, claims executive producer Kumar Mangat, has been working on a 3-D animation for the last six months. The animation will appear in the film for all of seven minutes.

Raju Chacha is expected to have more than 20 minutes of special effects; the average rate per second of graphics is Rs 8,000. This means Ajay will spend over Rs 1.5 crores on special effects alone.

But what is an additonal crore or two for a film that is special to you, right?

Incidentally, the film, which marks Anil Devgan's debut as director, should hit the screens on Id week (December 28).